“For this
commandment which I command you today is not too difficult for you, nor is it
out of reach. It is not in heaven, that you should say, ‘Who will go up to
heaven for us to get it for us and make us hear it, that we may observe it?’
Nor is it beyond the sea, that you should say, ‘Who will cross the sea for us,
to get it for us and make us hear it, that we may observe it?’ But the word is
very near you, in your mouth and in your heart, that you may observe it.” Deuteronomy
30:11 – 14.
Might have Agur
been thinking of this passage in Proverbs 30:4? Of course we don’t really know,
but let’s take a look at it nevertheless because it is an element of the
Biblical motif of ascending and descending, and of descending and ascending.
Consider the
context of our Deuteronomy passage, Moses is speaking some of his last words to
the people of Israel as he prepares to be taken by Yahweh. How have the people
been accustomed to hearing the word of God? How did they hear it in Egypt? How
did they hear it in the Wilderness? Where did Moses go to receive the Ten
Commandments? Where was Moses when he received God’s commandments concerning
the Tabernacle and Levitical system of worship?
Moses had served
as a mediator between Yahweh and Israel. Moses brought the Word of Yahweh to the
people of Israel in Egypt. Moses went up Mount Sinai to meet with God and to
bring God’s Word back down the mountain to the people. Moses also communed with
God outside the camp in “the tent of meeting” (Exodus 33:7); neither the
mountain nor the tent was accessible to the people. The people of Israel were
unaccustomed to having the Word of God accessible to them, they had to rely on
a mediator.
But now, in
giving his last words to Israel, Moses says to them, “But the word is very near
you, in your mouth and in your heart, that you may observe it.” That which had
been outside of them was now inside of them. That for which they depended on a
mediator was now theirs to access, engage with, and to obey.
In the account of
Moses, can we see a foreshadowing of Jesus in the Upper Room?
“I will ask the
Father, and He will give you another Helper, that He may be with you forever;
the Spirit of truth, whom the world cannot receive, because it does not see Him
or know Him, but you know Him because He abides with you and will be in you.”
(John 14:16 – 17).
“These things I
have spoken to you while abiding with you. But the Helper, the Holy Spirit, whom
the Father will send in My name, He will teach you all things, and bring to
your remembrance all that I said to you.” (John 14:25 – 26).
What was Moses
saying in Deuteronomy 30:11 – 14? At the very least, at its most basic, Moses
was saying that there is a Way to live that is outside the Levitical Law, a Way
that has always been accessible to men and women created in God’s image – the Way
of faith, the Way of Abraham, the Way which is our Lord Jesus Christ (Romans 4;
Galatians 4).
We see this in
Romans 10:6 - 8:
“But the
righteousness based on faith speaks as follows: Do not say in your heart,
Who will ascend into heaven? (that is, to bring Christ down), or Who will
descend into the abyss? (that is, to bring Christ up from the dead). But what
does it say? The word is near you, in your mouth and in your heart – that is, the
word of faith which we are preaching…”
We respond to
this “word of faith” internally, by confessing Jesus as Lord with our
mouth and believing in our heart that God raised Him from the dead, and thus
are saved and made righteous in Jesus Christ (Romans 10:9 – 10).
And yet, is this
our testimony? Is it our testimony in terms of the Way we live, and of the Way
that lives in us? Going back to the above passages in John 14, are we living in
communion with the Holy Spirit? Indeed, with the Holy Trinity? When many
Christians speak of having a “testimony,” we often mean a testimony of initial
salvation and we seem satisfied to leave it at that, as if signing on some
unseen dotted line is the beginning and end of our faith, our experience, our testimony.
But what are we to learn from the Parable of the Sower (Matthew 13)? Can we not
see that simply witnessing seed sprout is hardly soil for an enduring
testimony?
How many of us
speak of the Holy Spirit as a Friend? A Comforter? A Teacher? How does our
relationship with the Holy Spirit compare with what Jesus portrays in John
chapters 14 – 16? To reduce the Holy Spirit to promptings of conscience, or
feelings, or certain thoughts, is hardly to speak in terms of an intimate relationship,
of an ongoing and growing and maturing life in the Trinity. Yes, the Holy
Spirit speaks to us through thoughts and feelings and conscience, but this is
not a relationship, at best these are modes of communication.
To know the Holy
Spirit is to worship the Holy Spirit. Are we worshipping Him, for He is God? To
know the Holy Spirit is to obey the Holy Spirit, for He is God. To know the
Holy Spirit is to have the Living Word dwelling in us, speaking to us, growing
in us…as our Way of Life.
Are we living as
if “the word is very near you, in your mouth and in your heart, that you may observe
it”?
Am I?
Are you?
Are our congregations?
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